Wednesday, September 19, 2012

What the OSR ought be doing.

In general I like to focus on describing what going on and develop terms to describe what I see. For example when I look at folks who say they are part of the OSR the only common element I see is that they play an older edition of D&D and don't think it broken or outdated. Everything depends on where you are looking. Which is why I say the OSR is comprised of fans of older editions of D&D.

But some folks launch into a debate with me and say "Well, what about Traveller, Tunnels and Trolls, etc, etc. They are old school too." To which I say yes they are old school, but the OSR is foremost about playing older editions of D&D . However depending on who you talk too. You will find interest in all those games and more. The fact that the group of gamers who like playing and publishing for older edition D&D got labeled as the Old School Renaissance is one of those accidents of history.

This is not to say I don't have an opinion on what ought to be going on. I say that in the upper right corner of this blog. What ought be going on with the OSR, especially on the publishing end, is that people should try to look at their favorite older game and say to themselves

What can I do different with the game that was not tried back in the day because of circumstances or the interest of folks back then.

If are you not doing this don't sweat it. Because first and foremost the ultimate goal of what we are doing is taking these dusty old games off of the shelves and start playing them again to the enjoyment of a new generation.

7 comments:

As regards Tunnels and Trolls, my impression is that there's a relatively stable population of players that hasn't changed much since the fifth edition of the game was published. With the release of 7/7.5, interest has probably picked up some, but this is in no way comparable to the large-scale move from D&D 3.5 back to 1e or OD&D that arguably began the OSR.

The 'Old School Renaissance' may be about playing and experimenting with older editions of D&D, but there's much more to old-school roleplaying games generally, which is why you get pushback from gamers who play Traveller, The Fantasy Trip, &c.

Too many of the definitions of 'old school,' exclusive of the 'renaissance,' are narrow and parochial as a result of forcing them into the D&D mold.

This is probably why I don't feel I belong in the OSR. Your idea of what they should be doing is the exact opposite of what I think they should be doing. Which is to find out how games were actually played back in the day (up to 1973) and try to replicate that open playstyle regardless of the actual ruleset.

@Hedgehobbit - there is a strong preservationist streak throughout much of the OSR. For example OSRIC is specifically designed to preserve AD&D 1st edition and allow people to publish new material for the game.

Part the reason it was developed was because of the controversy that arose during the development of Castles & Crusades. C&C can use AD&D modules with no conversion but the game itself is not AD&D and has a different feel. The folks at Knights and Knave then developed OSRIC first as a publisher reference and then in it second version a standalone rulebook.

Bat in the Attic Games

How to make a Sandbox

The Old School Renaissance

To me the Old School Renaissance is not about playing a particular set of rules in a particular way, the dungeon crawl. It is about going back to the roots of our hobby and seeing what we could do differently. What avenues were not explored because of the commercial and personal interests of the game designers of the time.

What are RPGs?

A game where the players play individual characters interacting with a setting with their actions adjudicated by a human referee.

Rules are an aide to help the referee adjudicate actions and to help the players interact with the setting.

Dice are used to inject uncertainty which make a tabletop RPG campaign more interesting than "Let's Pretend".

The only thing a player needs to do to roleplay a character is to act if he or she was really there in the setting in that situation.